hand dyed yarn Archives

Posted on December 18, 2020December 18, 2020 by Nancy

More Turquoise (and Cerulean)

I am taking a weaving class Understanding Overshot with Janet Dawson (https://weavingwithjanetdawson.thinkific.com/) and I need more turquoise for the warp as well as the tabby weft (this project takes 2 wefts, one for tabby/background and one thicker for the pattern. Lots. Well, I had lots of 8/2 rayon and 10/2 cotton dyed already, but not really enough of any color. I had 3,000 yards of turquoise in 3 shades so I figured that was plenty if I did a gradient…until I remembered I like to make long warps. The class only requires 5 yards but I wanted to do 10 of course.

Long story short, I wound and dyed some more turquoise but as I got started I realized I was not certain it was in fact turquoise and not cerulean blue. I did both, as well as some bronze and a shade of brown the name of which I cannot remember. The top of jar had “Great Color” written in Sharpie (??)

I did the yarn in all the blue shades and two pieces of rayon/synthetic blend fabric, one was Devore velvet (acid etched) with rayon velvet on nylon, I believe, potentially to be sewn into infinity scarves later. Additionally I grabbed two big hanks of natural cotton, plied light and dark shades, just for kicks.

Just wanted to shoot the fabric draped. These have not been sewn at all yet, but I was eager to see how the dye took to the fabric and how they would work out. I ironed them a bit to dry the fabric, but hey may be a skosh lighter when fully dry.

In other news, I finally photographed some shawls here and knit a few fun hats! I cannot stop creating, but getting them photographed and listed is the big challenge!

All the Flowers Handspun Yarn

$28.00

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Harvest Rusty Violets Handspun Yarn

$38.00

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Product on sale

Pinky Delight Handspun Beret

Original price was: $81.00.Current price is: $64.00.

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Ruby Jewels Wrap Shawl

Original price was: $255.00.Current price is: $125.00.

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More to come soon, in the mean time, do something you love today! Make some colorful fun!

Happy Whatever you Celebrate & Lots of Love to you,

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Posted on August 23, 2020August 24, 2020 by Nancy

Recent Pieces

I started a shawl swatch to see how I liked my recent hand dyed yarns. One was a 3 strand novelty cotton combination and the second one here was 100% cellulose paper yarn. After a bit I realized the shawl was not going to work out so well, so I was playing with folding and arranging the piece into an embellishment, flower or something…It totally made me want to try hyperbolic crochet with the paper yarn. See below!

The result of the hyperbolic crochet edging play is shown here, basket is paper yarn carried with 3 strand novelty cotton yarn. I used a J hook for most of the basket. I switched to g for last couple rounds. Edging is just the paper yarn. Both yarns hand dyed by me.

I started edging with 3dc in each stitch around, about 3/4 of the way around the basket, and finished the round with 2sc in each remaining stitch. Then with a bigger hook (a K hook I believe) I did 2sc in each stitch of the ruffle. The last round was one hdc in each stitch around. IT ruffles quite a bit and I like having the open edge of it although I am not sure of the practical application of the opening, I am sure there is one!

I dyed 10/2 mercerized cotton, some cotton t-shirt yarn which was constructed as a knitted tube, a 3-strand combination of novelty cottons skeined together, and some paper yarn (100% cellulose). Oh and some silk, too!

Here are some pictures of the yarns.

Hats are my comfort food. I’ve said so for years. Here are two recent completions. Both were Noro wool/silk blend yarns. Red blend is entrelac, the blue shades one is a lace rib pattern I devised extemporaneously. The afterthought crochet flower makes me very happy!

Posted on June 27, 2020June 27, 2020 by Nancy

Re-design, Re-thread & We’re Off!

I mentioned in a previous post that I wanted to rework a section of the weaving between the repeats…well, I found a way that only required one repair (string) heddle to be created in each section, which still was a pain in the tuchas but I went with it. So I had 6 sections of 9 threads each which first I counted out, to make sure I was shifting the correct threads. Fortunately they were in batches of three, so I counted, recounted, found an error, recounted again…then I could move one…..

Satisfied now I had the right threads, I removed them from the heddles, trying desperately to keep them in order, I re-threaded 8 of them and made a repair heddle out of silk and threaded that one last.Then I re-threaded those into the reed.

Once I got started weaving with this lovely green silk, I decided I wanted a darker and deeper and richer shade, like some of the threads I tried in the sampler. I loved how the turquoise came out and also the deep violet and royal blues. I decided to over-dye the silk and some of my rayon cones. I spent a day and a half winding hanks off of many cones and had a dye day in between weaving…I do find its good for me to break things up and do different things each day.

Some Dye Day Pics

I thought I would get to everything but the cotton will get done another day. So be it. I also had 4 t-shirts I had tied up previously waiting to dye with this batch as well so my day was full.

Here is the overdyed silk getting incorporated into my work:

So this is the journey. I am getting faster at walking the treadles, using both feet in order, working the advancing point twill pattern. I still unweave to fix bits, and I still have to count from some starting point to figure out where I am in my pattern…I find a center, either a one or an eight and I count. There is no paper. I have no paper.

Just 1234323454345654 etc….with L and an R between each. I do know that evens go with R and odds go with L and from which side to throw so there’s that. I say all things considered I am making good progress.

🙂